I choose to be American, I choose to live in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, I choose to have Puerto Rican/Jewish neighbors, and I choose to maintain my Chinese identity.

Everybody ought to have a lower East Side in their life.

I grew up in the Lower East Side, an Italian American - more Sicilian, actually.

The Tiffany lamp is an American icon bridging the immigrants, settlement houses, and the slums of the Lower East Side and the wealthy industrialists of upper Manhattan, the Gilded Age and its excesses.

I'm a black lady from the Lower East Side of New York. Not a lot intimidates me.

That's what's interesting about the Lower East Side: It's New York, but it's also edgy. It's not as stuffy as Tribeca or Soho.